


Crystal Clear

by j_gabrielle



Series: Significant Risks [3]
Category: James Bond (Movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mpreg
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-11-13
Updated: 2012-11-13
Packaged: 2017-11-18 13:57:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/561799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/j_gabrielle/pseuds/j_gabrielle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bond's POV of the events of Significant Risks</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Bond isn’t stupid. He is many things; a killer, a spy, a man with a ledger drenched in red. But a fool he is not.

The first indication that something big was happening around him that he was not privy to, was the way Dr. Gunthra looked at him whenever he saw her around MI6. There was something in her eyes that said of the desperation that she wanted to tell him something, mixed with a tint of frustration.

It would have been ridiculously easy to pry it out of her; a curve of a smile, an invitation to dinner, and by the time he was through, he would have had everything he needed. She wasn’t stunningly beautiful like the ladies he’s with most of the time, but she didn’t look half bad in a skirt either. Karen Gunthra was merely just… Not him.

Him with the birds nest hair and the body that seemed ready to be blown away by the next big gust of wind. Him with the many smiles, and only a few that truly meant something. Him, that fit like a glove in his arms when they shared a bed together. Him that made Bond feel something in him that he had thought he lost in the murky waters of Venice.

Then there was also the time he brought pastries to Moneypenny and he had not expected Q to be there too. When he was offered some, he declined. This struck James as odd, because this was bought from the ridiculously hipster bakery with the outrageous prices and the mind numbing music filtering through the air that James himself frowned upon and Q adored. He’d tried it once, in queuing like any other person would for his turn to pay, but standing in that line trapped between a gaggle of giggling girls who could not stop staring at his bum, and a couple who were not too subtle in the way that they whispered on how they would love for him to join them for a ménage a trois, made him itch for the gun he had on his persons.

And so, the next time he’d visited the bakery, it’d been right before the store had opened and he’d ‘helped’ himself to some of the pastries, putting them into the bakery’s take away boxes, all while the baker and owner himself was in the kitchen.

James had been excited when he dropped the pastry box for Q off at his lab. He’d fretted over what he should write on the note, when he finally settled on a simple, _For you_. James had gotten the 5 kinds of pastries that Q mentioned once in the passing that he favoured, taking the excess pastries to Moneypenny.

He’d been more than a little hurt when Q did not want to eat the pastries he brought.

James was half tempted to walk into Q-branch and take back the box that he _did_ get for him, but Tanner had called for him and by the time he’d had the free time to sneak into the lab, the box was in the trash. And it was empty.


	2. Chapter 2

The next sign was that Q disappeared whenever he was in the vicinity. As in, he would be walking down one end of the hallway, ready to call out to the young Quartermaster, and when he blinked, the man is gone. Vanished into thin air like an apparition.

He tried not to think much about it… But it’s hard.

James wrecks two punching bags as he tries to work out what he had done to offend the Quartermaster. When they were in the same room together, it seemed like he was often more than not moody and angry. Perhaps it was the weight gain? No, no… Q was never the type to be bothered by how he looked. So what was it then?

M drops a dossier on his table while he is having lunch. It is raining outside, veiling the world beyond the café windows a veil of psychedelic watercolour bursts. The man looked extraordinarily pleased with himself, sitting down in the empty chair across form him. Bond notes that his suit is damp and his hair a slight disarray.

“Your next mission.”

“Shouldn’t this conversation be held in the sanctum of your office?” Bond asks, sipping on his tea.

M quirks an eyebrow, lips thinning. “Go see your quartermaster. He will have your details and equipment.”

Bond scoffs, smiling bitterly as he sets his teacup down. “That’s easier said than done. The boy has been avoiding me for weeks.” He pauses, eyes narrowing. “Has he said anything to you? Anything about why he’d be… reluctant to be in my presence?”

M merely leans back in his chair and surveys him. A flicker of an emotion is fleeting on his face, but Bond notices it immediately; Realization. This makes him even more suspicious.

“Just go to him. You’re a double-oh. Find a way to corner him. I don’t care about your little spats, but get it sorted immediately. We can’t have these childish displays of immaturity. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes sir.” Bond replies, dropping his eyes to the table cloth. He catches M casting him a strange look, but when he lifts his head to answer it, the man is already half-way to the door. This was beginning to become extremely annoying. Everyone was in on the joke but him.

He leaves his money on the table, choosing to exit through the back door.

Bond tries for a more subtle approach when he is in Q-branch and the Quartermaster himself is briefing him on the tech. “If I were anyone else, I would’ve thought that you were avoiding me.” He says, smiling nervously. He wills it to be not true; for Q to deny it vehemently, to reassure him that that is not the case.

But the man merely snaps at him, “If you were anyone else, 007, I would have told you to stuff it.”

Bond shakes it off, playing it cool and walked to the opposite end of the table. He was only trying to be nice, dammit! Bond lets the sound of Q’s voice wash over him like water over sun dried land. He hasn’t heard him speak in weeks, hasn’t touched him in longer. Suddenly, there is a primal urge in him that called him to just grab hold of Q, drag him to the nearest bed available, and _make_ him tell him what was wrong. To just claim him again and again, until the only sure thing he knew was Bond’s name.

He blinks away the red tinges creeping up his consciousness. It will do nobody any good if he lost control here.

Bond controls what he shows on his face, looking back only to see Q looking as if Death himself had come a-knockin. “Are you alright?” He says, coming close and leaning in until he is shoulder to shoulder with Q. Bond can see Q relaxing into him, whatever was ailing him to be slowly forgotten, when he scowls darkly and pushes himself away. He watches, torn between anger, hurt and frustration as Q wobbles unsteadily in the direction of the Men’s.

Suddenly determined to get to the bottom of this, he looks around the lab, watching eyes avert themselves and bodies rearrange so that they did not stand out in the agent’s eyes. “You.” He says, crowding around one of the members of Q’s team that he’d seen before but had never bothered to learn his name. “Come with me.”

The man pales, but bravely nods, tucking his tablet under his arm and gathers his coat as he follows him. Smirking slightly inside, he notes the man’s face. ‘He might just survive this, after all’ He thinks.

“What do you want me to do?”  The man, _Richard_ -his tag read, asked when they enter an empty conference room.

“Can you access the servers and track down where Q is?” Bond sinks into a chair.

“I can.” Richard nods, fingers flying over his keyboard at break neck speed. It should feel like he was violating Q’s privacy, but Bond was tired of playing these games, of pushing and pulling and of neither party willing to give an inch. “He doesn’t know that I have access to these video feeds. Here.” The tech turns his laptop around, screen showing Q exiting the Men’s room. “I need to go back to the lab, or he’ll notice.” Bond gives an absent nod as he tracks the way Q’s hand cups his belly. “I can leave you here with the laptop and ensure that no one will disturb you for as long as you will need.”

“Thank you.” He says, eyes not looking away but meaning every word. Richard pauses at the door, clearly contemplating.

“Please find out what’s wrong with him? He won’t tell us anything and none of us are brave enough to ask.”

When Bond looks in his direction, Richard is gone.

He sits there, occasionally lifting a finger to trace the figure in the video. Q was distressed, that much was obvious. The man was nervous and on an edge, clearly uncomfortable in his own skin. Bond aches to comfort, to hold and to reassure.

Their relationship had always been a little strange. It was neither purely physical, nor was it just banter. Q… was intoxicating. And Bond wanted more of him in his life. He knows Q feels the same way; sees it in the way he looks at him, the way the bitter, sharp edges fall away when they are together. Sometimes, he wonders if he wanted too much from someone who was only prepared to give a little.

Q leaves the lab at around 6, walking off. Bond was prepared to log off, and leave, giving up on this enterprise altogether, when instead of heading out on the ground floor, Q ascends another few more floors and exiting at medical. Frowning and protective instincts kicking in, he watches Q and Dr. Gunthra move around each other in a familiar dance. Gunthra hands him a gown and he puts it on, lying down on the bed without being asked to. They have done this before, Bond realises with a sinking feeling. They have done this before and Q did not even flinch when she slipped an IV needle under the skin of the back of his hand. Bond’s frown deepened.

How long has this been going on?

Bond watches as Q falls into the arms of Morpheus. His face still looks troubled, even at rest.

He leans back against his chair, contemplating. Bond knows he has to be on a plane bound for Dubai in 10 hours, but… he is compromised. There is no way he could be on that plane, carry out the mission given to him, knowing that Q… Bond heaves a shuddering sigh. He doesn’t even know what is wrong with Q, in the first place.

He pulls up another window and accesses video recordings from archive, but he finds that there are some that have been tempered with or just missing altogether. He tries his hand in retrieving those that were deleted, but those were thoroughly wiped through. He thinks about finding Richard and getting him to restore what was lost. When he makes to leave however, the faintest of whispers carry from the speakers. “ _...to be our life, isn’t it?_ ”

Bond maximises the video, hypnotized by the way Q’s lips were moving and forming words. “ _I can’t tell him. Your father. I can’t and I won’t apologise for it no matter what people may say_.” Bond feels the earth beneath him tilt away, the air in his lungs leaving in an almighty whoosh. Suddenly, all the pieces of the puzzle slot into place.

The ill pallor.

The way he always has a hand over his stomach, almost unconsciously.

The _weight gain_ …

It all makes perfect sense! Q was pregnant! He almost leaps out of his chair then. “ _I wish I knew for sure how he’d react to you. I’d like to believe that in time, he would love you as much as I do already. That he would want you just as much I do._ ” Bond watches as Q turns his face into the pillow, watches the hand on his belly. He could see it now, the gentle swell. The evidence of a child. “ _That’s the problem, isn’t it? We can never be sure of the emotions of others but our own._ ”

Bond waits, running a hand through his short blonde hair as he makes certain that Q is asleep again. A child. He feels an overwhelming sense of joy, pride. It’s his, he knows it is. Bond cannot explain, but the child now growing in Q was his. He knew it in his bones.

“A baby…” He says into the air of the room. “My baby…” He laughs, cupping his hands in front of his mouth. A person that was half him and half Q. He shakes his head at that, grinning. The world had better watch out, because this child will be a _terror_.

Bond lifts a hand, tracing Q’s abdomen on the screen. “Our child.”

From where he is, he guesses that Q must be three to four months along, which fits into the timeline he had constructed in his mind. Which also means that Q has been keeping this from him. Shaking his head, he frowns. Q must have had his reasons and Bond decides that he will have to ask him.

He replays the video, listening to Q’s monologue, watching his every expression. Bond knows he should be furious at being kept in the dark. But all he could feel was the need to hold Q in his arms and reassure him that all will be fine. All he wants to do is to touch him, feel the bump under his hands.

Bond slips into the darkened corners of Q branch, waiting. He knows that the Quartermaster will be up soon, and he will come down here for the change of clothes he keeps at his desk. And sure enough, he catches the sight of him coming in through the door, shivering slightly in the cold air. Bond wishes that the man had a stronger sense of self-preservation.

“Why didn’t you come last night?” He says, wincing when he heard the thud of shin meeting wood.

“It doesn’t matter.” Q blushes, nostril flaring. He averts his eyes, turning away to open his drawer. “Shouldn’t you be on a plane--”

What he’d meant to say was, ‘I know that you’re pregnant’ or even ‘Why did you not tell me?’ Or maybe ‘Do you really hate me that much? To keep me from my own child?’. But what had slipped out was, “It matters to me!” Bond kept a tight hold of his thin wrist. He poured every single ounce of frustration and hurt into those four words, willing Q to understand. He pulls their bodies flush against each other, one arm around his hips. “Something is wrong and you’re not telling me!” He says heatedly, “You run the other way when you see me coming, you hide whenever I am in the same room as you are, and even now _you can’t even look me in the eyes_!” He seethes.

“L-let me go. Please.” Q pleads, a hand pushing against his shoulder. He is trembling, and all Bond wants is to hold on tighter, never to let him run.

“Not until you tell me. Tell me what is wrong. What did I do wrong? Have I done something I shouldn’t have?” He presses on, “It’s driving me _crazy_ that you’re angry at me for something I didn’t even know I did wrong… Q, please do not take me for a fool. There’s something that you’re hiding from me is there?” Bond whispers pleadingly. If Q had asked him to fall to his knees and beg, he would. Anything for him, he would.

“Let go of him 007.”

Bond releases his hold, scowling at M who is standing at the door looking grim and thoroughly unamused. _Step away from him 007_ His look said when Bond makes an aborted move to reach out and hold Q steady when he slumps against the edge of the desk. _Step away. Now._

Bond keeps his eyes on M as he shrugs off his coat, “You’ll catch your death in those things.” He drapes it over trembling shoulders, pausing, before brushing a kiss to Q’s crown.

He doesn’t look back as he leaves.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you have enjoyed this. Please tell me if you find any discrepancies between the two stories. I will add to this as I go along. Thanks for reading!


End file.
